Cookie Cutter
by Windswift
Summary: All the other mothers in Shuuichi's class were all alike, were good, traditional Japanese women. Shiori, on the other hand, is the bad, neglectful mother. Shuuichi's childhood wasn't very easy for anyone.


Disclaimer: YuYu Hakusho belongs to Yoshihiro Togashi

A White Day present for my AoSfME, Katia-chan.

_**Cookie-Cutter**_

They reminded her of the Western story about the gingerbread man.

All lined up in the room, looking like cookie-cutters, nearly exact replicas of each other: human-shaped, but with little character beyond their smug pride. A row of traditional Japanese women, small, with dark hair and eyes, each one a perfect dutiful housewife; they raised their children to be perfect and conforming like every other ideal Japanese child.

Her son had the Asian features, but his colors were foreign.

And she, she did not conform to the perfect cookie-cutter standards they had set for her.

She knew they had always whispered, but in the beginning, the rumors had been easy to ignore. Her husband had died, so she worked to support herself and her son. It was not wrong, exactly, because there was much Western influence in society. But she perhaps did not handle it the way the other mothers would have preferred.

Shuuichi, her little boy… she loved him, truly she did. She did not need a cookie-cutout son. So it was alright that he was strange, and bewildered her more often than not. She only wished everyone else could see that.

Was she really such a bad mother?

* * *

The rumors flared up, quick and vicious, the moment she fled the room.

On occasion, the mothers of the class held meetings, and Shiori was invited. Since Shuuichi was ten and mature for his age, she had felt safe in putting him to bed and leaving.

But Shuuichi had apparently gotten up and gone out to the park—no one knew why, as the boy refused to tell the police anything. He had not brought anything with him, either for vandalizing or leaving home, but they suspected he had planned to stay out for more than a single night's jaunt nonetheless. The only reason he had been found at all was that Shuuichi had apparently been accosted by a hobo and had not taken kindly to it. The police had heard the fight, recognized the young Minamino, and brought him home—again. When no one answered, a neighbor had given them the number of the house… and now nearly all of the mothers from his class knew that Shuuichi had to be escorted home by the police for the third time.

"What a neglectful mother."

In the weeks that followed, the spiteful whispers only got worse.

"What a terrible mother Minamino Shiori is."

"I wonder how she can hold her head so high in public?"

"She's been going downhill ever since her husband died."

The boy's only saving grace, it seemed, was the remnants of a strong character—no help from his mother—that prevented him from roaming the streets as a miscreant punk. The women speculated on how long it might be before that happened, or he ran away completely. They pointed out that Shuuichi might become like that Urameshi boy, and compared Shiori to Atsuko. Of course, one expects such behavior from the son of a drunk and a whore who lacked even the decency to marry the man. But perhaps Shiori was also a whore—where did her son get his hair, after all? And his eyes, neither side of the family had eyes his shade. And if she liked to drink, then she hid it well, and who could blame Shuuichi for trying to escape?

Luckily, Shiori did not have to face the other mothers as often as she might if Shuuichi had made many friends. True, her son was well-liked, but he tended not to associate with the children outside of school. This, too, Shiori had to swallow blame for as one of her many faults.

* * *

Shuuichi was asleep in bed under the watchful eye of a babysitter, content that Daddy was "going out for a play-date with one of his lady friends," so Hatanaka Kazuya was only too happy to be escorting Shiori home, arm in arm. He had been rather fond of her ever since they met at work, and they were content to become friends slowly, for the sake of their once-spouses and two young sons.

Tonight, they shared a soft kiss on the doorstep before she unlocked the door, pointing out where he could lay his shoes and coat and directing him to the living room, and murmured that she wanted to check on her son.

Kazuya had not heard her come back down in her quiet stocking feet until he noticed the muffled sobs from the kitchen.

She was slumped over the table, her face buried in her arms, and he could tell from the heartbreaking sounds that before him was a woman desperate. Wrapping his arms around her shoulders, he offered comfort to this woman he loved until she turned to him, eyes red with crying.

"Shuuichi's gone again, and I don't know what to do! I don't know what I've done… I'm such a bad mother. Maybe… maybe I shouldn't be with you. I know that he knows about us, even though he hasn't said anything. I love seeing you, Kazuya, but maybe it might be better if we stopped for a while. Please…"

And he held her all the tighter, because he could never have said no.

When the doorbell rang, her eyes were drier, but anyone could have seen the agony in her face as Shuuichi entered, flanked by an annoyed police officer. People had long since tired of the missing child joke.

The boy's features were rigid and set, Kazuya noticed, but not the ones of a runaway. No, his face should have been sulking at being caught—or relieved for the attention at being found and returned. Shuuichi's expression was resigned, and not even at having his attempts thwarted again. It was as if he were finally ready to accept something.

Shiori kneeled down and tentatively wrapped her scarred arms around him, to hug him, and he returned the embrace, pressing his face against her shoulder.

Kazuya thanked and dismissed the officer, and he noticed that as Shiori carried her child up to bed, his face was almost peaceful.

After that night, he never ran away again.

* * *

When Shuuichi disappeared for a while, with those false lies and mysterious bloodstains and friends that accidentally called him something like "Kurama," she always wanted to ask, because she loved him. But then he looked at her with those unfathomable eyes.

And when she was alone, Shiori pressed a fist against her mouth and sobbed, "I'm not a neglectful mother."

**…****  
Owari  
…**

_-Windswift_


End file.
